PNC Bank part of new retail lineup at Prudential Center

PNC is opening a small bank inside Prudential
Center, one of the first signs of commercial development tied to the NHL
arena in Newark, N.J.

The financial services firm, a Devils founding partner
since the arena opened in October 2007, sponsors the PNC Bank Tower on the
northeast corner where 80 percent of hockey fans enter the facility. The new
bank, with street access, opens Sept. 28 next to that entrance.

PNC exercised an option in its original deal to open a
location inside Prudential Center, said Michael Brundage, the bank’s executive
vice president for retail in northern New Jersey and northeast Pennsylvania.

Per those terms with the Devils, PNC pays rent to the team
in exchange for operating the bank through September 2012, with two one-year
options.

The 1,800-square-foot space, built in a storage area
reserved for the bank, will have six full-time PNC employees. They will focus
on one-on-one communication with arena workers and area residents interested in
opening and managing new accounts, Brundage said.

In addition to a PNC Bank location, the Brick
City Coffee Co. is among three other
new businesses at the arena.

A full-service PNC Bank is within three blocks of
Prudential Center for account holders wishing to conduct other business, he
said.

The arena’s bank will be open during regular business hours
Monday through Friday. As of last week, PNC was still determining hours of
operation on game days, but the branch will not be open on weekends, Brundage
said.

PNC officials are confident the new branch will thrive as
the Devils and city officials continue to develop property surrounding the
arena.

“The whole area is slated for major improvements in the
next several years,” Brundage said.

The Devils have found other private operators to run three
new businesses at the arena: a sports bar on the north side called The Penalty
Box, plus a “burger and beer joint” and the Brick City Coffee Co. on the
arena’s south side underneath a parking deck, said Devils owner Jeff
Vanderbeek. The coffee shop opens next week, the burger-and-beer eatery around
Thanksgiving and The Penalty Box in January.

PNC Park in Pittsburgh, where PNC holds the stadium’s
naming rights, has a bank inside that facility.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Sports food consultant John Sergi plans to take a class of 40 students
from Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration to a Mets game at Citi
Field on Thursday to see firsthand Aramark’s operation at the new
ballpark.

Sergi earned a master’s degree in hospitality from Cornell
and will be a guest lecturer Sept. 24 at the school, as he has done on previous
occasions.

It’s part of Sergi’s effort to start a new two-credit
course at Cornell focusing on strategic studies of food in sports, a slice of
facility operations he says could be more closely examined in sports management
curriculums. “There is [little] formal education in that end of food service,”
Sergi said.

Learning the finer points of concessions and catering deals
could not come at a more critical time in the industry, when food providers are
facing increased pressure to reduce prices and develop more value, he said.

“We need to come together with ownership,” Sergi said.
“There is a failure to understand in the context of a deal that there is a
better way of doing business than giving 52 percent of hot dog sales to the
team.”

Sergi continues to talk with Cornell officials for
developing a class that begins in the 2010-11 school year, and said he has the
support of Marc Bruno, Aramark Sports and Entertainment’s president of
arenas and stadiums and a fellow Cornell graduate.

ON TARGET:Delaware
North Sportservice’s Pete Spike moved from one AL Central market to
another. Spike, most recently general manager at U.S. Cellular Field in
Chicago, assumes the same role at Target Field, the Twins’ new home
opening in April.